The Count of Monte Cristo

Alexandre Dumas

Analysis of Major Characters

Chapters 1–5

Themes

Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas
explored in a literary work.

The Limits of Human Justice

Edmond Dantès takes justice into his own hands because
he is dismayed by the limitations of society’s criminal justice
system. Societal justice has allowed his enemies to slip through
the cracks, going unpunished for the heinous crimes they have committed
against him. Moreover, even if his enemies’ crimes were uncovered,
Dantès does not believe that their punishment would be true justice. Though
his enemies have caused him years of emotional anguish, the most
that they themselves would be forced to suffer would be a few seconds
of pain, followed by death.

Considering himself an agent of Providence, Dantès aims
to carry out divine justice where he feels human justice has failed.
He sets out to punish his enemies as he believes they should be
punished: by destroying all that is dear to them, just as they have
done to him. Yet what Dantès ultimately learns, as he sometimes
wreaks havoc in the lives of the innocent as well as the guilty,
is that justice carried out by human beings is inherently limited.
The limits of such justice lie in the limits of human beings themselves.
Lacking God’s omniscience and omnipotence, human beings are simply
not capable of—or justified in—carrying out the work of Providence. Dumas’s
final message in this epic work of crime and punishment is that
human beings must simply resign themselves to allowing God to reward
and punish—when and how God sees fit.

Relative Versus Absolute Happiness

A great deal separates the sympathetic from the unsympathetic characters
in The Count of Monte Cristo. The trait that is
most consistently found among the sympathetic characters and lacking among
the unsympathetic is the ability to assess one’s circumstances in
such a way as to feel satisfaction and happiness with one’s life.
In his parting message to Maximilian, Dantès claims that “[t]here
is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the
comparison of one state with another, nothing more.” In simpler
terms, what separates the good from the bad in The Count
of Monte Cristo is that the good appreciate the good things
they have, however small, while the bad focus on what they lack.

Dantès’s enemies betray him out of an envy that arises
from just this problem: despite the blessings these men have in
their own lives, Dantès’s relatively superior position sends them
into a rage of dissatisfaction. Caderousse exemplifies this psychological
deficiency, finding fault in virtually every positive circumstance
that life throws his way. Caderousse could easily be a happy man,
as he is healthy, clever, and reasonably well off, yet he is unable
to view his circumstances in such a way as to feel happy. At the
other end of the spectrum are Julie and Emmanuel Herbaut—they are
fully capable of feeling happiness, even in the face of pressing
poverty and other hardships. The Dantès of the early chapters, perfectly
thrilled with the small happiness that God has granted him, provides
another example of the good and easily satisfied man, while the
Dantès of later chapters, who has emerged from prison unable to
find happiness unless he exacts his complicated revenge, provides
an example of the bad and unsatisfiable man.

Love Versus Alienation

Dantès declares himself an exile from humanity during
the years in which he carries out his elaborate scheme of revenge.
He feels cut off not only from all countries, societies, and individuals
but also from normal human emotions. Dantès is unable to experience
joy, sorrow, or excitement; in fact, the only emotions he is capable
of feeling are vengeful hatred and occasional gratitude. It is plausible
that Dantès’s extreme social isolation and narrow range of feeling
are simply the result of his obsession with his role as the agent
of Providence. It is not difficult to imagine that a decade-long
devotion to a project like Dantès’s might take a dramatic toll on
one’s psychology.

Yet Dantès’s alienation from humanity is not solely due
to his obsessive lust for revenge but also to his lack of love for
any living person. Though he learns of his enemies’ treachery years
before he escapes from prison, his alienation from humanity begins
to take hold only when Abbé Faria dies. Until Faria’s death, Dantès’s
love for Faria keeps him connected to his own humanity, by keeping
the humanizing emotion of love alive within him. When Dantès learns that
his father is dead and that Mercédès has married another man, his
alienation is complete. There are no longer any living people whom
he loves, and he loses hold of any humanizing force.

This humanizing force eventually returns when
Dantès falls in love with Haydée. This relationship reconciles Dantès
to his humanity and enables him to feel real emotion once again.
In a triumphant declaration of emotion, he says to Haydée, “through you
I again connect myself with life, through you I shall suffer, through
you rejoice.” Dantès’s overcomes his alienation, both from society
and from his own humanity, through his love of another human being.

Motifs

Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, and literary
devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes.

Names

The constant changing of characters’ names in The
Count of Monte Cristo signifies deeper changes within the
characters themselves. Like the God of the Old Testament, Dantès
assumes a host of different names, each associated with a different
role in his schemes as the agent of Providence. He calls himself
Abbé Busoni when standing in judgment, Lord Wilmore when engaging
in acts of excessive generosity, and Monte Cristo when assuming
the role of avenging angel. That Dantès possesses so many identities
suggests that he lacks a true center.

Villefort also changes his name, though for different
reasons: he refuses to adopt his father’s title of Noirtier, a name
closely associated with the despised Bonapartist party. Villefort’s
choice of names signifies both his political opportunism and his
willingness to sacrifice ruthlessly those close to him for his own
personal gain. Fernand Mondego’s change of name to Count de Morcerf
is, on one level, merely a sign of his ascent into the realm of
power and prestige. Yet, since Mondego pretends that Morcerf is
an old family name rather than merely a title he has purchased,
the name-change is also a symbol of his fundamental dishonesty.
Mercédès also undergoes a change of name, becoming Countess de Morcerf.
This change in name, however, as we learn when Mercédès proves her
enduring goodness, does not accompany a fundamental change in character. Instead,
her name-change merely emphasizes her connection to her husband,
Dantès’s rival, and, by association, her disloyalty to Dantès. Only
Benedetto’s change of name, to Andrea Cavalcanti, seems to signify
nothing deeper than the fact that he is assuming a false identity.
All of the other name changes in the novel are external signals
of internal changes of character or role.

Suicide

Many characters in The Count of Monte Cristo—Dantès,
Monsieur Morrel, Maximilian Morrel, Haydée, Fernand Mondego, Madame d’Villefort,
and Albert de Morcerf—contemplate or even carry out suicide during
the course of the novel. Dumas presents the act of suicide as an
honorable and reasonable response to any devastating situation.
As in much Romantic literature, suicide in The Count of Monte
Cristo is most closely linked with failed romantic relationships.

In fact, eagerness to take one’s own life for the sake
of a beloved is held up as one of the only sure signs of absolute
devotion. Monte Cristo is convinced that Maximilian loves Valentine,
for instance, only when he sees that Maximilian sincerely wants
to die when confronted with her loss. Likewise, Monte Cristo believes
that Haydée loves him only when she swears that she would take her
life if he abandoned her. The frequency with which suicide is mentioned
or contemplated by characters might seem to reflect a cavalier attitude toward
this most serious of acts. However, suicide is clearly regarded
as a serious action: Dantès gravely warns Maximilian not to take
his life if there is anything in the world that he regrets leaving.
The characters in the novel are not arrogant about life—they simply
live it melodramatically, finding the world devoid of hope and meaning
on a fairly regular basis.

Politics

The Count of Monte Cristo is a historical
novel, with key plot elements drawn from real historic events. Politics,
therefore, play a significant role in the novel, particularly in
branding certain characters good or bad. All of the major sympathetic
characters are somehow connected to the democratic ideals of the
Bonapartist party, from Morrel and Noirtier, who were once ardent
fighters in the Bonapartist cause, to Dantès, who emerges as a champion
for individual rights. Likewise, in his wooing of Valentine, Maximilian
fights for social equality, another Bonapartist ideal. Many of the
major unsympathetic characters, by contrast, are overwhelmingly
associated with the oppressive, aristocratic royalists, such as
Morcerf and Villefort. Others are simply self-serving capitalist
opportunists, such as Danglars, responsible for ushering in the
soul-deadening age of the Industrial Revolution. In this sense,
Dumas does not assign political allegiances arbitrarily, but uses
them as windows into the souls of his characters.

Symbols

Symbols are objects, characters, figures, and colors
used to represent abstract ideas or concepts.

The Sea

When Dantès escapes from prison, he plunges into the ocean,
experiencing a second baptism and a renewed dedication of his soul
to God. He has suffered a metaphorical death while in prison: the death
of his innocent, loving self. Dantès emerges as a bitter and hateful
man, bent on carrying out revenge on his enemies. He is washed in
the waters that lead him to freedom, and his rebirth as a man transformed
is complete. The sea continues to figure prominently in the novel
even after this symbolic baptism. Considering himself a citizen
of no land, Dantès spends much of his time on the ocean, traveling
the world in his yacht. The sea seems to beckon constantly to Dantès,
a skilled sailor, offering him perpetual escape and solitude.

The Red Silk Purse

First used by Monsieur Morrel in his attempt to save the
life of Dantès’s father, Dantès later uses the red silk purse when
he is saving Morrel’s life. The red purse becomes the physical symbol
of the connection between good deed and reward. Morrel recognizes
the purse and deduces the connection between the good deed performed on
his behalf and the good deed he once performed himself. Morrel concludes
that Dantès must be his savior, surmising that he is working from
beyond the grave. Morrel’s daughter, Julie, then emphasizes the
symbolic power of the purse by keeping it constantly on display
as a relic of her father’s miraculous salvation.

The Elixir

Dantès’s potent potion seems to have the power both to
kill and to bring to life, a power that Dantès comes to believe
in too strongly. His overestimation of the elixir’s power reflects
his overestimation of his own power, his delusion that he is almost
godlike, and his assertion that he has the right and capacity to
act as the agent of Providence. It is significant that, when faced
with Edward’s corpse, Dantès thinks first to use his elixir to bring
the boy to life. Of course, the elixir is not powerful enough to
bring the dead to life, just as Dantès himself is not capable of
accomplishing divine feats. The power to grant life—like the power
to carry out ultimate retribution and justice—lies solely in God’s
province. It is when Dantès acknowledges the limits of his elixir
that he realizes his own limitations as a human being.

This for the full version if your not reading the full version this will get you even more confused than the book does. The Count of Monte Christo is a good book but not when your confused about the Plot i'm in the middle of reading it and think the spark notes really help.